


Steel and Soul

by Domovoi



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, DCU (Comics), Superman (Comics)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-14
Updated: 2015-07-14
Packaged: 2018-04-09 07:14:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4338950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Domovoi/pseuds/Domovoi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kal-El and Bruce Wayne are definitive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Steel and Soul

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first. I'm a fanfiction slash-writing virgin. Don't be lenient. Be honest. 
> 
> No particular timeline or express universe yet. I haven't decided what exactly I want to include.

"Really. It is quite beautiful."

Bangar had explained that the dance was a traditional one meant for three, but most of the Uggaali people had insisted on joining. Their overtly long limbs outwardly seemed awkward, but it served only to intensify the fluidity of the dance - apparently traditional, but Kal-El suspected political changes warranted an addendum - transformation more like - to art and culture as well here as on Earth. The other way around rather. 

"If you say so." His tone was obvious.

"Why don't you try to appreciate the celebration? Instead of sulking. This is ..." The rest was dead to Kal's ears. 

The ceremony and reception had been fine. Typical of the Justice League's interstellar excursions. It was the dancing that made him uneasy.

Bruce wasn't wrong when he said it was beautiful, he just ......... it was ... rather sensual. If this was cultural, fine. But they could have been gone already - Bruce had insisted they stay. Negotiations, as per the norm when closing a deal and getting a treaty in place, began somewhat gruff, and flat-lined with a little compromise and intimidation. Superman was usually the one to stress they remain through festivities, as a sign of respect. Ordinarily, Batman was stoic, passive; not suprisingly interested - relaxed even. 

"Superman. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine."

"You're either nervous or disgusted. Your grimacing might reflect poorly if anyone were actually paying attention to you." 

Kal-El sighed. Bruce, master of the indomitable physiognomy and author of "How to Brood: for the vigilante extraordinaire or stultified billionaire", asking him to lighten up. "I'm not grimacing, I'm just a little tired. We'll leave as soon as you're finished enjoying yourself. I've never seen you so relaxed at these things - you know, you should be like this more often, some league members might actually like you."

"Hm." Still watching the dancing.

Odd. Bruce was never so amicable. Everything was calculated, formal, and expository. Especially when it came to his personality. No, Bruce wasn't vain, but he never allowed imprecise commentary; he always clarified, always corrected. 

"Batman ... are YOU okay? "

"May I remind you that contentment is not completely without the realm of my emotional spectrum and that your gift for writing is not reflected in your speech."

Ah. There was the bat. Somehow even the backhanded compliment overshadowed by the insult seemed sincere. Such was the nature of man and mask. 

"Fine." It's not like Kal-El was worried about random changes in behavior. It could have been serious. Maybe Bruce had had something odd to drink or eat. Fine. The Batman didn't want to be bothered even in times of peace. Grumpy bastard.

"Do you want to leave?" He sounded like he was chewing ice. 

"Do you ever speak in a tone that doesn't make me feel like you're going to murder me if I don't guess exactly what's in your thick head and quote you verbatim?"

"Steel."

Kal silenced at that. Hardly audible for anyone listening, clear to Kal's ears, screaming to his mind.

Bruce had been put off after returning from a particularly nasty mission. Green Lantern was almost blown to pieces and Wonder Woman had been pummeled.

Bruce would have ordinarily considered the events with criticism and level reprimand. Except, it had been Batman's task to prep for the mission. Intel proved to somehow be faulty and they had entered the battle severely uninformed. Quick thinking was a given, adaptation a skill, prowess in the heat of battle trained. But the Ani'mali's weapons were more powerful than anticipated; they themselves were incredibly hostile, and miraculously well supplied. Hal had been the first down - no time to turn his constructs offensive had left a mangled heap of smoking flesh and bone. The league had hardly commenced attack movements before Lantern's light was out. 

It seemed that he was intentionally targeted first - and without mercy. Both legs were hideously burnt. Right forearm broken. Face fractured in several places. Kal had not realized Diana was able to bruise let alone snap bone; her right forearm was broken as well.

Kal-El had tried to speak to Bruce once they had returned to the Watchtower and put Hal and Diana in the Medical Bay. No mention of the previous hours encounters would take place in the following months. 

He was in the conference room staring out into space.

'Bruce-'

'Leave it, Steel. Another time.' It was as much disappoinment Kal had ever heard in Bruce's voice. Meaning it hardly registered on any human scale as being near emotion at all let alone a reading of specific proportions. 

Bruce couldn't be.... angry wasn't the right word. Whatever it was, Kal-El had no idea what the hell this name - hardly a term of endearment - meant and couldn't gauge Bruce's mood based on its use. It was discomforting at best.

Whatever it meant was probably too demanding to worry about now. 

"Yes, let's go." Kal was admittedly relieved.

.......

Turns out the nickname would continue to show up. It was always different and nothing short of unsettling.

Bruce had agreed in the early stages of the League that their having some kind of social relationship would be necessary to maintain something about balancing whatever and presenting a united leadership or other. 

So they met every two weeks as much as time would allow - Bruce had also insisted this rank as a priority, so cancellations were frowned upon. 

Mostly they had lunch and talked which initially stalled Kal-El, but he recognized a need to take time aside from work and the League to not talk about work or the League, blah, blah, blah. 

In any case, they had become suprisingly good friends. 

...

And that's how Kal-El found himself at a small non-descript diner near Metropolis suburbia. 

This time it was in Bruce's greeting.

"Steel, how are you?" Bruce was grinning idiotically for some reason. A wave of paranoia washed over Kal-El for a moment and he realized the nickname could be utterly patronizing or ... demeaning? .. whatever word meant off-putting. It also crossed Kal-El's mind that he had never thought of anything Bruce had EVER done as idiotic. 

"Hi, Bruce. .. What's wrong with your face?" Something about laughing gas flitted through Kal-El's head and was dismissed. "You look like-" he almost made some insensitivity about the Joker amd barely caught himself "You look good."

Bruce made no sign he had noticed the stumble. 

"Actually, that's what I want to talk to you about."

"Should we order first?"  
...

"So, then I get back and Diana has Barry and Hal in the lasso."

Kal-El chuckled. It was nice to see Bruce this way. Another one of those rare instances in which he was remarkably relaxed. He was, of course, no social bore - he had clearly mastered the nuances of social communication to a fault and was nowhere near unbalanced, clumsy, unsure, or all of the things Kal-El felt when trying to keep up with the man. 

There was also something eerie about it. 

Bruce continued his story about that one time Diana got Hal to eat cat food - how the hell that happened on the Watchtower was not worth dwelling on. 

It occured to Kal-El that Bruce's odd behavior might not be what it seemed. Bruce was master of the exterior. 

Kal-El frowned. Perhaps it was a moment of extreme opposite raction. It was entirely possible - and, truthfully, more likely - that this outburst of exuberance and show of such contrasting personality away from the Wayne persona was a result of a seriously depressing event. 

With Bruce, no chances could be taken. Kal-El could see it now in Bruce's eyes. Random shifting to exit or salt shaker. Fiddling with a fork in his hand and the motoric tapping of his foot were no longer nothings of excitement, but definitely something's of meaning. He must have been masking some borderline-traumatic event with was probably for Bruce truly incredible and excessive mirth. What could possibly render the Batman's explicit defenses shorn?

He touched Bruce's hand with his. "Bruce." It was hardly audible to even Kal's ears. Bruce's pounding heartbeat was not so quiet. 

His eyes had watched Kal-El's hand move to his. Only Superman's superhuman gifts could have detected the hitch of breath or slight twitch in his eye and pounding blood from his heart. 

"Bruce, let's go. Come on."  
...

Bruce was silent after that. Completely still. Eyes focused, but mind elsewhere. 

Kal had gotten Bruce out of the diner and back to his apartment almost as if though via verbal wheelchair. He spoke aloud everything he was doing to get Bruce to move along - standing up, opening the door, putting on the seatbelt, driving back to his apartment, climbing the stairs, setting down on the sofa. 

"Bruce. What happened?" 

Bruce sat. And stared. They were inches from each other, face to face, but Kal-El got the feeling Bruce neither heard nor saw him. 

"Bruce," Kal-El coaxed. 

Something flickered in Bruce's face and he was finally looking at Kal. 

They still sat, though. Kal knew Bruce must be going through an ordeal in his head. He would wait for Bruce to reach a conclusion. He would silence himself for his friend. 

Kal simply studied his face. Somehow Bruce's face looked as muscular and powerful as the rest of his body. Stout chin. Sharp cheekbones. Everything a neat array of impenetrable planes. Perfectly framed by his incredibly black hair. Even his lips looked like a force to be reckoned with. As in everything regarding Bruce, his face was foremost and commanding. 

The longer he stared at his eyes, though .... something different. They looked guarded and remote. The first was expected. Bruce was discipline incarnate and the personification of control. Both warranted the second, yet somehow felt contradictory; it had always seemed that Bruce was not simply more 'present', more 'here', but in essence was more alive and being and secretly feeling than anyone Kal had ever met. 

Kal-El had once taken time to ponder that particular axiom about eyes being windows. It seemed to him that if it were indeed the case that eyes either mirrored or magnified deeper or greater human being - as far as humans being - then it would seem darkness signified depth and meaning and complexity, rather than empty or gruesome or tainted or undesirable or less. It well might be that light meant shallow and superficial and blissful and ignorant and perfunctory and vapid, rather than serious or expressive or fulfilling or profound.

And then there was that barely-perceptible grasp for more than solidarity. A shadow of a shadow of a maybe in Bruce's unshifting eyes. There was a resonance in his body reaching without reaching. It felt the, way a tree looks growing out of the side of a cliff. Tenacity. Ferocious tenacity. 

The room - the world - suddenly felt too small. And Bruce suddenly was too close. Kal-El suddenly was too nervous. 

And then Bruce reached for him.

**Author's Note:**

> This is just the beginning! Please let me know what you think. 
> 
> So far, all Kal-El's POV. Next up: The Bat.
> 
> BTW: I don't have a beta reader...
> 
> PS: Smut??? Yes. But later.
> 
> ... liberties taken in involvement of other characters...


End file.
